


pedal to the metal (i'm your soldier)

by hawksonfire



Series: Star Spangled Bingo 2019 [10]
Category: Marvel
Genre: Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov Friendship, Clint Barton Cuddles, Couch Cuddles, Cuddling, Deaf Clint Barton, Human Disaster Clint Barton, Human Heater Clint Barton, Hurt Clint Barton, Kisses, M/M, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, Natasha Romanov is the Human Form of a Cat, POV Clint Barton, Pre-Relationship, Sleepy Cuddles, Snuggling, Steve/Natasha if you squint, Tony Stark Cuddles, Touch-Starved, Touch-Starved Bucky Bucky Barnes, no i will not be taking questions, thank u next
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-05
Updated: 2019-09-05
Packaged: 2020-10-10 16:02:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20530721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hawksonfire/pseuds/hawksonfire
Summary: Bucky's touch-starved. Clint makes it better.





	pedal to the metal (i'm your soldier)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Winterhawk Bingo Square N2 - Touch Starvation.  
Also written for Star Spangled Bingo Square N4 - Friends to Lovers.

**Clint**

He thought maybe he was imagining things at first. Imagining the way Barnes leaned into touches without realizing it, imagining the way he would jerk away from casual touches while simultaneously looking at the way the team touched each other longingly. The only one Barnes even _ let _ touch him was Steve, and that wasn’t really a surprise. The guy had been tortured and poked and prodded and generally not had a _ good _ touch for nearly a century - Clint would probably react the same way.

Hell, he had reacted the same way. He knows how it feels to long for and yet be terrified of touch. He gets it. And he wouldn’t wish it on anyone - well, maybe a couple people. And it’s not like it’d be a hardship to touch Barnes, the guy isn’t exactly ugly. He’s kinda fucking gorgeous, actually. 

“What do you see?” Tasha asks him from where she’s curled into his chest.

“Something I can fix,” Clint replies honestly. She rolls off of him, landing on her feet - as always - and runs her fingers through his hair, letting her nails scratch at his head. 

“Then fix it,” she says, smirking down at him as his eyes flutter shut. She scratches his head for a second longer, then removes her hand and walks away to go to whatever it is Natasha does when she’s not terrifying people or pretending she knows more than she does. 

“Aw, head rub, no,” Clint whines, opening his eyes to find Barnes staring at him longingly. His heart flutters, but he squashes that feeling ruthlessly - he’s not dumb enough to think that longing is for him. “You want some of this, Barnes?” He opens his arms and waits, watching as Barnes inches closer to him - then shakes his head and vanishes from the common room. Clint shrugs, only a little disappointed. “Next time, then.”

He stays in the common room for a couple more hours, dozing on the couch. He’s woken up twice, once by someone staring at him so hard he can feel their gaze - but when he opens his eyes, there’s no one there so he shrugs and goes back to sunning himself - and the second time when Tony comes stumbling into the common room, mumbling to himself, and flops down on top of Clint. 

“When did I get a purple couch?” Tony buries his head in Clint’s armpit and promptly falls asleep, giving off little snorts every few minutes. Clint blinks down at him at first, a little surprised, but then shrugs internally and slings his arm across Tony’s back gently. Tony’s warm, and Clint’s tired.

They doze for a couple hours, and when Tony jerks upright panting, then slumps back into Clint’s grip - well, Clint figures it won’t hurt if Tony stays longer, so he pretends to be asleep. Lets his mouth open a little bit, keeps his eyes closed and his breathing steady, and lets Tony clutch his shirt and bury his face into Clint’s chest for a few minutes. 

“I knew I didn’t get a purple couch,” Tony says absently as he walks away, rubbing at his face. 

(When Clint complains about the wet patch on his shirt later - “How did I even drool that far down, is that even humanly possible?” - no one except him, and possibly Tasha, notice the little twitch of Tony’s cheek.)

(Clint doesn’t say anything about the new grip he receives for his bow the next day - bright purple and just the right amount of squishy.)

~~

The next time there’s an opportunity for Clint to offer Barnes some good touches, he’s completely hopped up on painkillers and about as unthreatening as a freakin’ puppy. “Come cuddle me, Barnes,” he slurs, holding his arms wide open. He’s laying in his hospital bed, hooked up to all sorts of monitors, and the only reason he hasn’t escaped yet is because they’ve kept him so high that his legs feel like Jello.

So do his arms, for that matter. And his torso. Clint is basically a pile of Jello with a face at this point. “My face is Jello,” he says seriously. Barnes laughs at him. “Don’t laugh at me!” Is he pouting? Clint feels like he should be pouting. He pokes at his face - ooh, _ squishy _. Barnes gently moves his hands away from his face and Clint pouts - probably - again. 

“You have no idea what you’re saying, do you?” Barnes says, his eyes crinkling at the corners. Aw, crinkles, no. 

“Do so!” Clint insists. “Jello face, crinkles, good touches!”

“None of that made a lick of sense.”

“Did too, you just don’t understand my geni-gune- smarts.” Clint crosses his arms - or at least, he tries to, but Barnes is still cupping Clint’s hands in his. 

“Sure,” Bucky says. 

“If you’re gonna hold my hands, you gotta cuddle me too.” Clint nods after he speaks. This will be a good way to get Bucky used to the good touches again. 

“Good touches, huh?”

Clint gasps. “How do you know about that?” Bucky shrugs. “Good touches because you haven’t had any for a really really long time and that’s not good because cuddle are the _ best _ and I’m the least scary person in the Tower except for Bruce but he’s got his own stuff about touch so we don’t touch him without letting him know first just like we do with Tony and Tasha and Steve and Sam and me and you. Thor’s okay most of the time but when he isn’t he tells us and then we’re careful -”

“Clint, _ breathe _!” Bucky says, grabbing his face. Clint obediently sucks in a breath, crossing his eyes in an attempt to make Bucky laugh. It works! Bucky snorts and releases his face - aw, no, he likes when Bucky’s touching him, he has nice hands. 

“So, are you gonna cuddle me or not?” Clint asks, scootching over to make more room in the teeny-weeny hospital bed and lifting his arm, ignoring the way Bucky’s eyes have gotten real big. 

“Are you sure -” Bucky starts to ask, but Clint is way too exhausted after all this talking so he just whines and makes grabby hands at Bucky, doing a happy little wiggle when the shorter man slides in next o him, sitting up against the wall. Clint pushes into his space and shoves his face into Bucky’s stomach, grunting as he gets comfortable. 

“You make an excellent pillow, Barnes,” he mutters, already half asleep.

“Call me Bucky,” Bucky says, running his fingers through Clint’s hair. Clint lets out a purr and snuggles deeper into Bucky’s warmth, mumbling something that could be “M’name’s Clint.” He’s asleep within minutes after that.

~~  
  
He wakes up to a headache, gummy ears from keeping his aids in all night and a murmured conversation happening beside him. “Are you alright, Buck?” Steve, then. He’s the only one who calls Bucky ‘Buck’.

“‘M fine, Stevie,” Bucky says, still running his fingers through Clint’s hair, “He’s warm, and it’s nice to have someone trust me enough to sleep on me.”

“You know you can tell him to get off, right? He’ll listen, Clint’s good like that.” Steve sounds a little worried, like he thinks Bucky’s just doing this because Clint dropped on top of him and refused to move.

“He said he was fine, Steve, and it’s not like he couldn’t move me if he wanted to,” Clint says, sitting up and yawning. There’s a slight tug on his hair as Bucky’s fingers get tangled and Clint winces, reaching up to help remove them. He pulls Bucky’s hand gently from his hair then tangles the fingers and just tightens his grip slightly when Bucky tries to pull away. “Supersoldier, remember?” He gestures to Bucky, then to himself. “Unenhanced meatball.”

“Slab of beef, more like,” He hears Bucky mumble from beside him and he snorts. 

“Thanks, Bonky, ‘preciate it. You ain’t too bad yourself.” Bruce walks in then, eyes on a clipboard, and he stops dead when he looks up to find the three of them staring at him. 

“I can come back,” he offers.

“‘S’all good, Doc,” Clint says, yawning, “What’s the damage?”

“You’ve got a broken leg from falling off that building, and you hit your head pretty hard. No concussion but you’ll likely be sleepy for the next few days, maybe even the next couple weeks.”

“So nothing new then, just stay off the leg?” Bruce nods, waves goodbye and leaves, letting the door swing shut behind him. “So which of you super-strong super-soldiers is gonna carry me back to my room - Thanks, Steve!” Steve’s laughter echoes through the hallway as Clint and Bucky watch him vanish through the door. 

“Looks like I’m up, then,” Bucky says, sighing.

“You don’t gotta, I was only jok- _ Fuck! _” Clint lets out a manly yell as Bucky lifts him out of the bed. “At least let me climb on your back, Jesus, Bucky!” He scrambles around Bucky’s torso, wrapping his legs around Bucky’s waist and perching his chin on the shorter man's shoulder. “There. Now we can go.”

“Would you like some Skittles while you’re back there, Your Majesty?” Bucky snarks.

“You have Skittles and you didn’t share?” Clint pouts, and then he flinches as a Skittle hits him in the eye. “Ow.”

“Catch the damn candy, Barton, don’t waste it!” Bucky throws another one and this time, Clint catches it in his mouth - and promptly spits it out. 

“Gross, green! Gimme all the purple skittles or I’ll die on your back and you’ll have to carry my corpse to the graveyard.”

Bucky scoffs. “Please, I’d dump your ass in the dumpster so fast you’d barely be cold before I was done with you.”

Clint blinks. “Wow. Harsh. I thought we were friends.”

“I’d like to be,” Bucky says softly, and Clint almost doesn’t catch it as it’s so soft.

“Then we’re friends, easy as pie.” Clint catches another purple Skittle in his mouth. 

“Just like that?” Bucky says skeptically.

“Just like that,” Clint agrees. He smiles gently at Bucky, then makes grabby hands in front of his face. “Now throw that Skittle!”

~~

Things go a little smoother after that. It takes a few months for Clint’s leg to heal up, and in that time he hangs out with Bucky nearly every day. They slowly graduate from little touches to warm Bucky that he’s behind him, to bro-hugs and high-fives, to full out snuggling on the couch. 

He regularly takes naps on the common room couch (it’s so much better than his) and he nearly always wakes up with someone else on top of him - more often than not, it’s Bucky. 

When he asks Tasha why people like to sleep on him, she rolls her eyes at him and takes pity. “The only other person who puts off as much heat as you do is Steve, and he doesn’t sit anywhere long enough for someone to fall asleep on him.” This last bit is said with a slightly raised voice as Steve skids into the kitchen, grabs a muffin and is gone again before Tasha even finishes talking. 

“Well, that’s -” Clint’s interrupted by Steve careening back into the room, muffin half-eaten and chocolate smeared at the corner of his mouth.

“That’s not fair, Nat, you know the serum makes me restless.” 

“Fuck the serum, I want to nap on you,” Nat says blankly. Steve stares at her, and when she raises an eyebrow, he slowly sinks onto the other couch and spreads himself out. Tasha promptly gets up and walks over, then daintily perches herself on Steve’s thigh. “As I was _ saying _, you two are the warmest people in the Tower, and thus are the most comfortable to sleep on.”

Clint struggles to hold in his laughter at the sight of Tasha slowly sinking into Steve’s warmth - Steve looks terrified, but also hopeful, and the resulting expression has Clint biting down on his tongue to keep himself quiet. By the time she finishes talking, she’s sprawled over Steve’s torso like a cat - in fact, she looks pretty close to purring.

Like she can read his mind - and Clint’s honestly not sure that she _ can’t _ at this point - her half-lidded eyes snap open and she fixes Clint with a glare. He nearly swallows his tongue in his effort to keep a straight face, and she smirks lightly, before going back to kneading Steve’s thigh like dough. 

“Stop laughing, I’m trying to _ nap _ here,” Bucky groans. Steve chokes on his muffin as Bucky pokes his head out from behind Clint - he tucked himself in there right before Tasha got there and didn’t move until now, and the way she blinks at him makes Clint think she didn’t know Bucky was there either. 

“How long have you been back there, Buck?” Steve asks after he recovers from the assassination attempt via muffin.

“Longer’n you, punk, now shut it.” Bucky tucks his head back into Clint’s neck, lips just barely brushing the bumps of Clint’s spine, and goes silent once again. 

“How did I not see you?” Steve cries, and he goes to get up - Tasha jabs her nails into Steve’s leg, _ perilously _ close to a certain area of skin that does not deserve her nails being punched into it, and Steve goes white, settling back into the chair. He even lets out a little squeak, making Clint snort - which is, apparently, the last straw. 

“You are all the literal worst and I hate every single one of you,” Bucky grumbles, climbing out from behind Clint, picking him up, and storming out of the room. 

“Where we goin’, Buck?” Clint asks, hooking an arm around Bucky’s neck. 

“My place or yours, somewhere I can get a decent sleep,” Bucky says, and then he falters as he realizes what he said. 

“My place has nicer blankets,” Clint points out gently, and that’s that. Bucky reroutes to his place and they end up in his bed, awkwardly laying on either side of the bed. “This is ridiculous,” Clint decides, and he sits up, pulls off his shirt, and yanks Bucky towards him, curling an arm around his waist. “This okay?” He asks quietly.

“Sure,” Bucky responds shakily, and Clint takes a hand in his and rubs small circles into the top of it until Bucky relaxes slightly. Clint closes his eyes, tilting his head towards Bucky when the other man taps the tip of his ear lightly. Bucky removes his hearing aids gently, and presumably puts them on the nightstand where Clint normally keeps them, then tilts Clint’s head up and presses a soft kiss to his lips. 

Clint’s eyes fly open and he stares at Bucky in shock. “-- sorry, didn’t -------- sorry!” Bucky says, but he’s talking too fast for Clint to catch all of it. Clint grabs Bucky’s face in his hands and kisses him, hard, to shut him up. When he pulls away, Bucky’s eyes are wide and he’s staring at Clint. 

Clint makes the ‘ok’ sign against his chest, then does it again when Bucky just keeps staring at him. This time, Bucky nods at him, so Clint kisses him again gently then closes his eyes and slows his breathing purposefully. He feels the rhythm of Bucky’s breathing change to match his, and they fall asleep together, intertwined and tangled up in each other, just as they should be.

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on the [ tweets](https://twitter.com/candycanedarcy)
> 
> follow me on the [ tumbles](https://candycanedarcy.tumblr.com/)


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